Raymond, George Lansing. (Author and University Professor.)
I am opposed to Socialism because I think it founded on a misconception of the requirements of human nature; and this, mainly, for three reasons:
First: A great many people will not practice diligence and thrift, unless stimulated to do so by a possibility of obtaining, possessing and using something that they can call their own. This is something that Socialism theoretically, and so far as it has been applied, practically, would deny them.
Second: A great many will not work at all, when their only inducement is that others wish them to work, or need their help. Socialism, if established, would be obliged—merely to secure support for the community—to force such people to work against their own wills. This would inevitably involve the re-establishment of a system of human slavery.
Third: All a man's mental and moral development in this world—to say nothing of what may come after death—needs training. According to a law apparently divine, but certainly human, this training, whether in home, school, business or society, is imparted by means of discipline. The discipline is mainly derived from the circumstances of life in which one finds himself placed, and, in such cases, is always accompanied by dissatisfaction with one's alloted place, and by actual suffering. The Socialist aims to escape from this dissatisfaction and suffering by making a change in his circumstances—such a change, for instance, as would make a king a servant, or make all men kings or servants. But history and experience show that kings, whose friends die, courtiers flatter, and enemies trick, are no more free from the sufferings attendant upon discipline than are servants. The truth seems to be that to occupy a different position in life means merely to be placed in a different part of the same apparently divine and certainly social machine which—as some have faith to believe—is at work grinding out of the coarse grain of humanity what shall, some day, prove to be its fine flour. One who has the wisdom to apply this theory to life, will, in no position that a man can fill, feel either too haughty or too humiliated to sympathize with everybody, and to do his best everywhere to alleviate suffering, lessen oppression, equalize opportunity, enthrone justice, and prove himself, in every sense of the term, a fellow-man. The result upon individual consciousness and conscience of this attitude of mind is the most important of any that can be exerted in order to secure human welfare. It differs from Socialism in being derived—as Socialism is not—from a recognition of the exact and entire truth—a truth that includes, both that which is material and spiritual, philosophical and religious.
Ellis, Horace. (President Vincennes University.)
Socialism originally meant to become an effective protest against the tyrannies of all forms of monarchy. If it had succeeded in its ambition we all had been Socialists. But it failed utterly. Its failure may be traced to certain fundamental errors as to the means it should employ to realize its purpose. It presumed that most practices it found in the economic world were inherently bad because they had been employed by heartless men in furthering their individual interests. Socialism denies the accepted maxim relating to competition—in spite of the evidences of history which have fully established the fact that, in every realm of human activity, competition has been one of the mightiest factors for individual, community, national and racial prestige. Socialism would deny to virile, purposeful, masterful leaders of men the privilege of leadership because, forsooth, some such leaders have misused authority reposed in them. In lieu of this practice, it would constitute society at large the rightful leader in all economic matters—because some evidences appear which indicate that society possesses some attributes of stability. Fatal—both of these deductions. There are many thousands of good Socialists, but few substantial economic contentions behind them.